Jonola14

STING-Y PORTIONS

The timing was going to be absolutely perfect. Kick-off was three minutes away and the oven timer indicated that my meal would be ready in two. The vegetables were on and cooking nicely and the potatoes were drained and ready for mashing. It couldn’t have been better timed.

The lights flickered and as I mashed the potatoes, I saw movement out of the corner of my eye. ‘Bloody moth must have got in through the bathroom window’ I thought to myself as I turned to see what the mysterious flying thing was in the kitchen. I was very wrong.

There, buzzing around angrily, flying into the kitchen ceiling spotlights and then divebombing straight afterwards was a massive wasp. I’m not talking your standard sized wasp, oh no. This was a giant wasp, a genetically-modified wasp, a SUPER wasp that was well over an inch long. And it was pissed off.

It flew directly at me as I turned and in that split second I knew what it was. Ducking, I grabbed for anything I could defend myself with. The nearest thing was a large plate, so I wafted it at the intruder as I contemplated what to do. I bitterly considered the timing of the attack. The bloody timing! It couldn’t make its appearance when I was cutting the vegetables or peeling the potatoes, no. It had to be seconds before I served up the meal and headed into the other room for the football. How long was this going to take? Was my meal going to get ruined? Poxy wasp.

And then I hatched a plan. I turned off the gas and ducked out the room, closing the door behind me. Swapping the plate for my electric Bug Zapper, I returned to the kitchen, powered up the voltage through the zapper and slowly pushed open the door.

The wasp was really not happy. It was still flying into the hot light, forgetting that it was hot, getting singed and then dive-bombing anything that came close to it. I watched its routine and took baby steps forward. I absolutely had to get this right - bad aim or poor timing would send the wasp over the edge and make it mad. It came for me but was too high, I half closed the door in some sort of shield-like defence and the wasp re-rallied for another attack.

Concerned that my vegetables would turn soggy, I knew that I had to be bold and take action. ‘Attack is the best form of defence’ I thought to myself, certain that that sort of cliché would undoubtedly be repeated in the football commentary, which was kicking off any second now.

I ventured forward, racket poised in front of me like I was about to return Federer’s first serve. I was relying on the speed of my reactions and a suitable height to hit the wasp. It dropped from the light once more and I temporarily lost sight of it, I hesitated, unsure of where it was or what it was about to do. But then I caught sight of it, hovering at chest height after another fall from the light. I pounced, striking the wasp in the centre of the racket and sending it spiralling across to the other side of the kitchen where it struck the fridge and rebounded onto the floor. Fifteen love.

Was it dead? I wasn’t sure. I jumped over to where the stripey insect was lying, powered up the zapper once more and offloaded another load of voltage through its venomous body. In fact there was so much voltage that the wasp stuck to the grill of the zapper, allowing me to open the back door with my other hand, and in one movement, I released the power to unstick the wasp, flicked it up into the air and volleyed it as hard as I could into the neighbour’s garden.

And I even managed to catch kick-off. Wasp 0-1 Jonola.